A/N:

I know I've been dead for like the last month, but I'm finally back! :)

I'll leave a longer note at the end, but I need to clarify something:

Hakke Kushou is a more focused version of the Heavenly Spin, with which Neji can expel chakra from his palm to attack opponents out of his physical reach.

This jutsu's strength hasn't been confirmed as it hasn't appeared in the actual series yet. I found the info from wikipedia and the Shippuuden playstation two video game. According to the latter, this jutsu was powerful enough to create a palm shaped dent in a mountain, so don't scream at me later for making Neji do something really crazy/potentially impossible with this technique.

Now, on with the story.

Disclaimer: Wish I did, but I don't.

Tenten frowned in concentration, organizing her chaotic thoughts while absently twirling a kunai around her index finger. The cool, familiar smoothness of the metal was relaxing, but not relaxing enough.

Lee had already left to buy dinner before beginning his guard shift, which would leave her in the room with their other teammate for, at the very least, the next eight hours. Aforementioned, emotion impaired teammate's vocabulary, which was apparently limited to mono-syllaballic words and phrases that were more fit for missions than normal conversation, as well as his attitude were seriously getting on her nerves.

The kunai's revolution stopped abruptly as Tenten sighed. The best thing she could do was to find Soichiro-san. That way, Hyuuga-taichou could meet him when he got back, and she wouldn't be all alone with him until he was finished talking with Soichiro-san, something that would hopefully take a while.

Tenten climbed off her bed and holstered her kunai before heading for the door.

Truth to be told, she had absolutely no idea why she was getting so flustered over something as trivial as this. Hyuuga Neji was was just Hyuuga Neji.

Well he did see you in a towel so it's only fair that you got to see him shirtless.

The weapon mistress ignored the blush spreading over her cheeks as she quickened her pace.

Well, if it was any consolation, at least she was in her regular clothes again.

Tenten stopped in front of the room at the end of the hallway and knocked on the door.

The marketplace was still rather crowded, though significantly less than it had been during the day. Nonetheless, the place still retained its almost festive atmosphere.

Neji navigated his way through the streets, pausing for a moment to take a deep breath before exhaling it softly.

The distractions all the noise was providing and the cool evening air had helped.

A lot.

His meeting with Suzumura-sama hadn't taken long; the daimyo was just as concerned as he was by the discovery, and his latest order was for them to investigate the case.

However, considering the circumstances, he knew that the likelihood of his team finding anything within such a short amount of time was slim to non-existent. The mission would have to be delegated to the other ninja when they arrived at a later date.

Since then, the Hyuuga had spent the last few hours patrolling the city, as well as trying to convince himself that he had averted his eyes. That way, he could deny the fact that he had seen anything.

Unfortunately for him, the latter of his two tasks had gone rather unfulfilled.

Convincing Lee to switch shifts had been easy. All he had to do was use, god forbid, the word 'youthful' in his explanation, and Lee was gone before the over-enthusiastic shinobi had the time to notice the real reason behind his teammate's sudden request.

A muscle in Neji's jaw twitched.

Either way, as far as he was concerned, it never happened.

Neji activated his byakugan and began expertly scanning the city one last time.

"Tenten-san," Soichiro greeted, looking up from his seat at the desk across the room. He placed the pen he was holding on the table, most of which was cluttered with scrolls and sheets of paper that were more ink than actual paper.

"Have your teammates returned?"

"Not yet, but they should be back soon," Tenten replied, closing the door behind her.

"I've drawn out some maps of the mountains and the surrounding areas. You could take a look at them if you'd like." He gestured to a small stack of unopened scrolls on his right.

"Thank you. Sorry for the trouble," Tenten said apologetically as she walked over to his desk.

"It's no problem." Soichiro smiled briefly at the kunoichi before he went back to his work.

Previously, Tenten hadn't been able to see what he was doing. But from what she could gather now, he appeared to be studying a small black stone. Scattered on the polished wood in front of him were his handwritten notes, a magnifying glass, more dark coloured rocks, and very familiar white crystal.

"What are those?" Tenten asked curiously.

"They're some of the rock samples I got from the volcano." Soichiro put the stone he was holding on the desk. He picked up the diamond and held it up to the light.

"You see, most gemstones may seem perfect on the surface, but even they have their flaws."

Tenten looked at it again, this time through the magnifying glass Soichiro was holding above it. Only then did she notice the black spot on one of the jewel's otherwise unblemished facets. It was barely visible, but still there.

"As for these..." Soichiro replaced the diamond with the black rock he had been examining earlier. Tenten smiled when she realized that there were tiny crystals embedded in the stone's surface. Even the slightest movement made them seem to sparkle, like stars against the night sky.

"You'll only find the beauty in them if you look hard enough."

A cool breeze was drifting in from the open window on the wall to their left, but for some reason, Tenten felt a shiver sweep down her spine.

Then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw something land on the floor directly underneath the window. A second later, the room was filled with dark purple smoke.

Tenten's hand flew to her holster, but it was already too late. She only just managed to draw a kunai when a hand gripped her throat tightly, pinning her against the wall. Her assaliant jerked her wrist upwards sharply, forcing her to drop the kunai.

Gasping for breath, she grabbed onto the man with her free hand, digging her fingernails into his arm. He didn't even notice as he continued squeezing the life out her.

The smokescreen was starting to dissipate, but his mask and the spots dancing before her eyes prevented her from identifying him. She was getting dizzy, either from the lack of air, effects of the smoke, or both. Her arms had fallen limply at her side and she could feel herself slowly succumbing to the darkness.

Tenten was barely aware of the door banging open and a familiar voice shouting.

"Hakke Rokujuuyon Shou!"

The pressure on her neck vanished and she slid to the floor, coughing violently as she choked on the air filling her lungs. The assassin lurched, stumbled, and fell on the floor right beside her.

"Tenten!"

Eventually, her coughs subsided and her vision faded back into focus.

"Lee," she breathed groggily as the boy stooped down to help her up. "How-"

"We saw the smoke."

We?

Then Tenten remembered what she heard earlier. Even with his extensive array of taijutsu techniques, Lee didn't have one with that name.

There was the sound of footsteps approaching. Tenten's breathing was rapid and heavy as she looked up and saw Neji walking towards her, or more accurately, her attacker.

Were those ninja even after me?

Tenten glanced at Soichiro who was slumped against the desk, rendered unconscious by the sedative in the smoke. Behind him, the large frame of a second black-clad man lay spread-eagled on the floor.

If she hadn't been here, he would have certainly been killed; and if Lee and Neji hadn't arrived in time, she would have been dead as well.

When Neji bent down and ripped off the cloth covering the lower half of her attacker's face, Tenten's eyes widened.

"Who sent you here?" Neji questionned.

The "merchant" from Earth remained silent.

Neji glared at him with the full force of those piercing white eyes, the veins around them swollen with what Tenten guessed was chakra. Yet, the cool sheen of anger in his quiet voice was as controlled as ever.

"Do not make me repeat myself again. Who sent you?"

To the stone-nin's credit, he did not flinch. His eyes had stopped their pitiful attempt at finding an escape route that wasn't there.

"Iwakage-sama sent us to plant a bomb."

"Where?"

The man merely smirked.

SLAM!

There was a sickening crack as something broke. It wasn't the wall.

The stone-nin let out a small gasp of pain; Neji tightened his grip on the man's collar.

"You'll never find it," the stone nin said with a triumphant gleam in his eyes. A dark trickle of blood dripped down the side of his mouth as he spoke.

"...At dawn, you and this pathetic country will be destroyed."

First the bandits and now this, Neji sighed inwardly, resisting the urge to massage his temples. He could feel the tiredness creeping up on him, but he ignored it the best he could.

The two stone-nin were currently being interrogated by some of the daimyo's soldiers. They wouldn't be escaping anytime soon, courtesy of their sealed tenketsu points, but if they really were the professionals they claimed to be, they wouldn't be talking either.

The only option left was to find the bomb themselves.

But time was already running out.

There was soft buzzing sound followed by a voice in his ear.

"Nothing to report in the western marketplace, Hyuuga-sama. All the civilians in the area have made it safely to the mountains."

"Good. Move on to the next area," he replied into the microphone clipped to his collar.

"Hai."

Luckily for them, the city wasn't as expansive as most, but it was still large enough for its boundaries to be outside of byakugan's range; and judging from the amount of time the stone-nins had, it wasn't likely that they would have a very elaborate set up.

He had considered using byakugan, but the bomb could be disguised as literally anything.

It was like looking for a needle in a hay stack without even knowing if it was a needle they were looking for.

Or better yet, whether it's even there.

Up till now, the search had been focused on the central areas of the city. Even with the help of the civilians, their efforts had turned up nothing and they had no choice but to widen the search perimeters.

But, even if they did find it, there was no telling whether or not they would be able to disarm it.

Surprisingly, when Neji informed the daimyo of the impending crisis his country was facing, the latter was composed and almost completely unperturbed.

"I'll organize a full evacuation of the city immediately and grant you command over my soldiers. Will that be sufficient?" the daimyo asked.

"Suzumura-sama, I can understand why you don't want to involve the civilians, but we don't have a choice."

Even though the daimyo didn't want to admit it, Neji knew that he was right.

No one knew a city better than the citizens themselves.

"Then, I give you permission to do what you see fit."

Neji nodded, bowing before making his way towards the door.

"Hyuuga-san, I can see you're wondering why I can remain so calm."

The simple statement made Neji stop, but he did not answer.

"If a country is doing well," Suzumura continued, "those who stand to gain will be jumping onto the band wagon while those who don't will be throwing every spanner and wrench they can find into the works."

There was a hint of amusement in his weary voice as he said this, but his eyes betrayed the real story, the very reason for the alliance with Konoha.

"It's only a matter of when and how..."

And that 'when', Neji thought, watching everyone around him, soldiers and civilians alike, frantic and fearful as they rushed around, searching for anything that was there when it wasn't supposed to be.

Is now.

A beep and another voice. "Neji."

"What is it?"

"We've found something at the mines."

Neji broke off into a sprint.

"I'm on my way. Make sure no one touches it. Tell the guards to direct all civilians taking refuge there away from the vicinity."

"What about Tenten?"

"Ask her to meet with us there. Her channel number is 103," Neji said, his tone softening slightly.

"Roger." Lee's unusually serious voice faded into a hiss of static.

Although everything as far as the eye could see was still shrouded in shadow, no one was the least bit fooled by the facade. Daybreak was fast approaching, its crimson aura creeping over the mountains behind them, spreading across the gradually lightening horizon.

"This is the only one in the area, Tenten-san," Soichiro said as he walked over to join the two Leaf-nin. "I'm sorry. If I'd told someone sooner-"

"It wasn't your fault you were unconscious. If you hadn't told us, we wouldn't even have thought of checking here-"

"And it was thanks to your youthful spirit that we found it! You have our eternal gratitude, Soichiro-san!" Lee exclaimed brightly.

"Are you sure you don't want to leave?" Tenten asked worriedly. "If you go now-"

Soichiro shook his head. "I'll stay here to guide you back after you've finished."

"Thanks." Tenten turned to smile at the man beside her, but her smile was half-hearted.

"Yosh! All we have to do is wait for Neji. He's a Jounin so he will know what to do..."

It was at times like these that she found herself envying her teammate's naive optimism; his ability to have hope even though there was close to none...

Lee's knowledge about bombs wasn't exactly the best since he hardly used them, and although she was reasonably proficient in their usage and disarmament, she was a weapon mistress, not an explosives expert-

Poof.

"Where is it?" Neji's smooth voice cut her thought short, almost comforting in it's authorativeness.

After a few minutes of examining the bomb with his doujutsu, Neji looked up, his blank gaze meeting hers.

Damn.

"Can you disarm it?" he questionned.

"I can try."

It was the best answer she could give.

Neji stepped aside to let her through; Tenten knelt down on the ground beside the black, wooden box. Using the tip of a kunai, she unscrewed the lid before carefully removing it and delving into the mass of wires inside. Her hands were shaking more and more with every passing second, but she told herself to relax.

This was a delicate operation that couldn't be rushed. One wrong move and the stupid thing would just blow up in their faces. Or hers to be more precise.

Yeah, no pressure.

A few more minutes passed and Tenten was still working, unsure whether or not to be thankful for the better visibility.

Found it!

Dawn's first light penetrated the darkness and, as though time had ground to a halt, there was a moment of complete silence...

...then the world exploded.

Despite being slightly disoriented, Neji was the first to recover from the initial shock.

The blast had been loud enough to temporarily deafen them, but other than that, everyone else seemed alright.

He took a quick once over of his surroundings. Apart from the definite increase in the amount of light shining through the thin curtain of mist that had settled over the city and the surrounding mountains during the night, the landscape around them was totally unchanged.

Neji was certain that he had seen Tenten cut the wire connected to the detonator, the proof was lying innocently on the ground at her feet.

Then, he heard his own hollow voice saying what all of them had been afraid to think.

"It's a decoy."

"Then where-" Lee was cut off when a sudden tremor caused the ground to shudder beneath their feet. His question hadn't been directed at anyone in particular, but it was about to be answered.

'Hyuu--ma-"

Neji tried to adjust his malfunctioning earpiece, but he could barely make out what the man was trying to say though the shrill whine of interference, the latter of which only served to aggravate his headache, as well as the ringing in his ears.

"--the--vol--c--"

Neji whirled around, eyes widening when he saw the glowing river of ash and molten rock steadily oozing out the top of the volcano and down the largest valley.

The one that lead straight to the city and the surrounding mountains.

It was in the crater of the volcano.

The realization of the seemingly recklessness, yet sheer ingeniuity of the stone-nin's plan hit him like a ton of bricks.

This was one explosion they wouldn't be able to stop. No one would. The entire incident would be blamed on a supposedly natural disaster as long as no one lived to say otherwise.

Their desired effect had already been achieved.

But, there was one fatal flaw. By squandering their element of surprise during their earlier, albeit failed assassination attempt, the stone shinobi had provided them with the possibility of stopping them.

Hyuuga Neji had never failed a mission before, and he wasn't about to start now.

"How long?" he asked Soichiro.

"The lava will reach the city within the next twenty minutes. There won't be enough time to evacuate."

"Isn't there some way we can divert the lava?" Tenten asked.

Soichiro spent several precious seconds thinking before he was able to give an answer.

"The main valley branches off somewhere along the way. If you could somehow block the valley leading to the city, the lava would flow into the one leading to the sea. I can come with you to show you where, but this method requires a lot of precision-"

"There won't be a problem," Neji said.

"Let's go."

Lee lowered a slightly nauseous looking Soichiro, who had been slung over his shoulder, back onto solid ground. Admittedly, it wasn't the most comfortable or dignified way to travel, but time was of the essence.

It had taken them almost ten minutes to reach the place Soichiro had been talking about.

Within that same amount of time, the lava had flowed faster than they had expected and some of it was already making its way down the part of the valley below.

They didn't have much time left.

"There," Soichiro said, pointing at something on the the upper part of the valley that was within their line of sight.

The target was massive; a large, overhanging scarp on a cliff on the opposite side of the one they were standing on. Missing would be the biggest embarrassment of her career.

Tenten summoned several kunai with explosive tags attached from the scroll on her back as her sniper's eye did a quick sweep of the terrain. There were simply too many trees.

"I'm going down there."

"But, it's too dangerous!" Lee protested.

"Tenten-san," Soichiro added in a persuasive tone, but only managing to sound a note barely below horrified by her bravey or foolishness. "Maybe you should let-"

The kunoichi cut him off, her voice unintentionally more forceful than it had been.

"I have to go. I'm the only one who can do this."

It was silent until Tenten saw Neji making his way towards the edge of the cliff.

"Neji-sa-"

"You said you were going, didn't you?"

At this, Tenten quickly went over to join Neji before both of them jumped down into the valley together.

Up close, the lava was the exact same bright, reddish orange of newly forged metal before it was cooled in water, but the amount of heat radiating from this was a hundred times worse.

She could already feel the perspiration trickling down the sides of her face, and her vision was beginning to blur in the lack of humidity, but she managed to take her aim and throw the kunai.

A second later, Tenten knew that she had missed.

Neji had seen the kunai veer upwards, and he knew she had as well.

The heat was causing the air to rise, which in turn caused the kunai to go off target. Unfortunately, there was nothing either of them could do to prevent that.

He saw her gritting her teeth in irritation as she realized the same thing he had before she quickly summoned another set of kunai.

She started to form a series of handseals that were strangely familiar, and at the same time, not. Neji didn't know whether it was a jutsu he had seen before or a variation of one, but whatever it was, he hoped that it would work.

Failure wasn't an option; there was simply too much at stake.

"Hakke Kushou!"

A wall of Neji's chakra was pushing against the lava, holding it back to give her enough time to complete the hand signs for her technique.

His white eyes caught her shocked stare.

"What are you doing? I can't keep this up for much longer."

Her expression was replaced with one of concentration and she launched her kunai. This time, her aim remained true and the kunai buried themselves into the rock.

Neji stopped his technique and both of them began leaping up the sides of the valley.

Then, the rock beneath her feet crumbled, her leverage instantly lost.

In that split second he had before she fell out of his reach, Neji's chakra-enhanced eyes had clearly seen his own horror mirrored in her chocolate orbs. His anxiety had flooded him in a sudden, savage rush; and it was that surge of adrenaline, and the chakra that accompanied it, that had enabled him to catch his teammate's flailing hand before barely managing to get them both back up to safety.

"It worked," he said shortly, lowering her onto the ground.

He ignored Lee's barrage of "are you alright"s as well as the not so varied variations of the question, but the girl beside him nodded, her chest rising and falling unevenly as she looked up at him.

"Arigato, Neji-san."

On the endless expanse of deep blue just visible behind the mountain range, Neji could see the sun rising over the horizon as Tenten detonated the explosive tags.

One week later, in her ever-messy office, Tsunade was reading the letter Neji and the others had brought back with them after their trip to Lava, a large majority of which was spent commending her shinobi on their excellent work on dealing with the recent incident.

The Hokage wasn't the least bit surprised when she read and heard that those responsible had been a bunch of stone-nins.

Apart from the revenue generated by their ninja village, the economy of Earth country was mainly dependant on the export of natural resources, namely ores and precious stones. It was no surprise as to why they would want to sabotage Lava country, but she didn't expect them to go so far as to threatening to destroy an entire city and sacrificing thousands of lives just to eliminate the competition cutting a share of their market.

But all's well that ends well, Tsunade supposed, placing the letter inside a relatively empty drawer of her desk.

After checking that no one was coming, the Godaime reached under her desk for the sake Suzumura had so graciously provided her with along with a sake cup she had hidden away for special occasions such as this.

Shizune had gone off to run some errands earlier so she wouldn't be back for a while, and she would be free to have a nice long break until she did come back.

Tsunade poured the alcohol into the cup she and gulped it down with a flourish.

This was definitely the beginning of a very, very good friendship...

"What are you doing?"

"We are going to train!" Lee exclaimed, practically dragging one less than enthusiastic Hyuuga Neji towards the forest. "Training is most vital for the maintaining and development of our skill as ninja-"

"I was training before you interrupted me."

Lee gasped.

"But you were training alone! Traning by yourself is a sign of anti-socialness, and being anti-social is unyouthful!"

Neji didn't know whether to be insulted or not. The way Lee said it made it sound as though wanting some peace was the end of the world.

At least Gai wasn't here to add onto the already incessant chatter.

Then again, if Lee was the one who organized this training session, it was highly likely that their former sensei would be invited to join in their, as Lee had put it, 'celebration of their youthfulness'.

"-training with teammates fosters better relationships between the team's members and better team work on missions..."

Neji merely sighed and continued trying to block out the rest of Lee's tirade.

"Let go of my arm."

When they arrived at the clearing, Neji was relieved to see it empty apart from himself and Lee, but he had this feeling that something was amiss.

"Lee, you're late!" The musical strains of her voice drifted over the wind to him, the source stepping out from behind a tree, katana in hand and a smile on her face. "Oh. Good morning, Neji-san," she greeted cheerfully.

"Tenten, would you mind if Neji joins us for training?"

Neji's narrowed eyes bore into his grinning teammate, but his glare was not as forceful as he would have liked. In fact, his response was more of an instinct than an actual reflection of how he felt, a more accurate description of which would be along the lines of caught off guard.

But not in a bad way.

"It's okay with me," she shrugged.

"YOSH! Let's begin!"

While they were setting up targets and the rest of their training equipment, Tenten asked.

"Ne, can I just call you 'Neji'? Neji-san' is a little long."

Neji nodded in reply and she smiled, something he hadn't seen for a very long time.

"Could you show me the jutsu you did the other day, Neji?"

"Aa."

Neji made a mental note to thank Lee later.

Author's Note:

I have re-written this chapter so many times, as well as cleared nearly a dozen writer's blocks within the last few weeks that I decided I'd better just go ahead and post it. After my dear friend Midnight Memories beta-read it of course. ;)

Unfortunately, Jue is a little busy at the moment and doesn't have much time to reply to my emails and such. I really really really miss her and I'd hug her, but I'm on the wrong side of the world. T-T. Many thanks, and praises for your time management skills, for helping me with this chapter even though you're so busy. Domo arigatogozaimashita! Good luck with your ISU! 3

This is the end to this arc of the story and I'll be moving on to something new in the next chapter. A little hint: New and old OCs will be coming back/appearing in the next chapter. ;)

Byeeeee.